Something a little bit different
The door to the conference room opened, but only a few people inside stood as he walked in. Today was a casual day, slacks, nice shirt sports coat. He took a seat at the end of the table, and poured himself a glass of water.
“The answer,” he said, after taking a drink, “To your first question, is no, I haven’t decided yet. Herr van Delen was nice enough to give me a few days to consider.”
“Is it about money?” Rudolf Schneider asked.
“Yes, but not in the way many of you believe,” he replied, taking another drink of water.
“I have a contract, I just signed it, I am willing to honor it, and in the future, taking into consideration the direction the team is going, I am willing to sign a new contract with similar terms. Any articles you have seen, read or watched was not put out by me.” He said the last part looking at one of the men sitting in the back, a member of Hans Biermanns communications team at his construction company. The young man looked at him briefly, then glanced away.
“I have said it before, I will say it again, and if you do not believe me, I am not going to waste any more effort. We need to spend money. Smartly. This Schwabian Grandmother attitude of taking everything we get and sticking 30% of it in the savings account while only spending the remaining 30% we have left will endure us years of mid to lower table mediocrity, with the occasional European Conference League appearance. We will become a turnstyle club, young players will come here for low money, they stay a few years at best, improve, we move them on for big money, which we then sit on and do not improve the club with, with no gaurentees that we stay up either.. That’s not the sort of team I want to coach, I’m sorry, but there it is.”
The table was quiet.
“I am committed to the long term success of this club,” Nicholas said, finishing his water. “It just seems some of us have a different definition of what success means to us.”
“Can you promise European football next year?” A board member asked.
“No. If anything we will fall off to midtable.”
This was met by a series shocked faces and noises.
Nicholas filled his glass again and took a drink. “Aleksander Petrov is leaving, probably for Tottenham, because he wants to play for Pep and play European football, that is a higher level of European football. Teams are asking about Dragan and Christopher, and I suspect Sergio is going to get offers as well. That’s our Star Forward, Keeper, our left wingback, and our right wingback, for starters. And right now I get 25% of whatever I move them for, on top of the €20M you were…generous with.”
“Are you saying you can’t work with that budget?”
“Not at all,” Nicholas said. “I’ve proven in the past I can work and succeed on a shoestring. The problem is this is the Bundesliga. If you want to stay here and achieve great things we need to spend, smartly.”
“So you can’t work with the budget,” Biermann said.
“You misheard me,” Nicholas said, sitting back. “It’s not that I can’t work with this budget, it’s that I won’t.”
The room exploded, angry voices trying to outdo each other.
The loud “SMACK!” of the hand hitting the table silenced everyone, and caused more than a few people to drink.
“Enough with this childish bickering,” Klaus said. The outgoing President of the Supporters club was one of the few still sitting down. “You all are worse than my grand kids, and all three of them are younger than four.” He started to cough, and pulled out a handkerchief and spent more than a few seconds with it held to his mouth.
“This club has come a long ways in nearly ten years. If you had told me we would be in the Bundesliga, I would have died a happy fan. Now we are in the Bundesliga, we are a rising club in Europe, and we seem to be afraid of success. Why?” He coughed again and looked around the table.
“We have one of the best young coaches in the game, who could have left of at anytime in the past decade for greener pastures. We have had success in the Bundesliga, we are playing European football this season, and yet for some reason we hedge our bets against future failure? What good will this huge balance do us in Bundesliga 2? In 3.Liga? And he says to us all that we need to be smart, to not overspend, to not become another Kaiserslautern, or 1860 Munchen. Why are we fighting him on this? It certainly isn’t greed, is it?”
He looked around the room, and more than a few people avoided his look.
“Coach,” he said. “Nicholas…Nikki.” He smiled, somewhat paternally at the younger man. “I do not know why you have stayed with this club for as long as you have, why you have turned down the opportunities that have come your way as a result of how well you have guided the team so far. Before this meeting, the Supporters Club had one of its own, and I’ve been asked to tell you that you should take Ajax’s offer, and go work for a club that will appreciate your hard work, work with you hand in glove, and reward your efforts. We will not hold you responsible for leaving. Its obvious to us that this current board has no desire to do that,” he stopped talking for a moment, which is why tomorrow the Supporters Club will put forward a No Confidence Motion before the rest of the teams ownership. I suspect it will pass.”
Nicholas sat up like had touched a bare wire, he was not the only one, the meeting descended into shouting and screaming.
It came to a crashing halt when Klaus started coughing blood into his handkerchief, and collapsed on the floor.
It was what his dad used to call “Typical East German Weather”, dull grey, streaked with rain, and chilly without being cold.
The funeral was supposed to be a quiet affair, but when you had been the Supporters club president for almost fifteen years, “Friends and Family” took on a whole new meeting. There were few eulogies, but it was gratifying to see almost every player had shown up to pay their respects, including most of those who had been on vacation.
He had sat in the front, as was expected, but as the crowd began to thin out, after hugging Joanna and Hannah and a few others, he sat, until he was by himself. The rain was barely noticeable, just enough to be annoying, but he didn’t care. Standing up and stuffing his hands in his pockets, he walked down the headstones for a little bit, feet taking him on a path they knew well.
He took a few moments to clear the leaves and other detritus away from the headstones, kneeling down and wiping the dirt of his mothers with his hand.
“Hi Coach,” he heard a voice say quietly. He turned around, and saw Sasha and Ulrich standing there.
He nodded.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Ulrich said, but Nicholas waved that away.
“Your parents?” Ulrich asked quietly, and he replied with a nod.
“We are on the way to talk to mine,” Sasha said. She pointed in a direction but Nicholas didn’t look. “I come every couple of weeks to get them caught up on all things Dynamo,” she said.
“All things?” Nicholas said, looking at her and smiling. Ulrich covered his mouth, trying to hide a laugh that he turned into a cough.
“Yes, Coach-” she stopped talking when Nicholas held a hand up.
“Here, it’s Nicholas, OK?” They both nodded. “I suspect we’ve crossed paths before here, but-”
“Boundaries, Coach, I mean..Nicholas,” Sasha replied.
He nodded.
“How long has it been since you talked to them?” he asked, standing back up.
“Couple of weeks,” Ulrich replied.
“Lets go say Hello then, shall we?” Nicholas said, gesturing for them to lead the way.
It was a short distance, in which Nicholas found out Ulrich and Sasha were first cousins, their dads were brothers, both of whom were still alive, and Hertha fans apparently. Sasha looked like she was going to be physically ill mentioning it, but swallowed her pride and pronounced it like it wasn’t a curse word.
“Did you know Klaus was sick?” he asked them as they walked along the path.
“We knew something was up when he announced he was stepping down,” Ulrich said. “My understanding from talking to his wife was that he went to the doctor about eight weeks ago complaining about having a cold, and they found out it was Stage Four Lung cancer.”
Nicholas nodded, and they were quiet until they got to a family plot.
Nicholas stood aside as they others did their own maintenance on the area, then after listening to Sasha talk for a minute, to tell them about Klaus, she mentioned she had a special guest.
He stepped forward, and introduced himself.
“Hello, my name is Nicholas Schmidt.. You may know me as one of the two gentlemen who bailed your two daughter and nephew out of jail,” he said with a smile, turning around to see both Sasha and Ulrich looking anywhere but him. “I am the head coach of BFC Dynamo, and your grandchildren you were fans of the club as well, in fact some of their earliest memories were watching games at the old stadium.
“If they have been keeping you up to date, you know there has been a bit of turmoil at the club lately. Our friend Klaus, who you will meet, if you haven’t already, can fill you in on the details. I’ve already told my biggest fans the news, but I thought maybe sharing it with you would be appropriate as well, for as much headaches as they’ve given Klaus and I thru the years, they are the best group of Ultras a club could have.”
He turned and looked at Ulrich and Sasha.
“Before the funeral, I called Chairman van Dalen, and told him I couldn’t accept his offer to join Ajax.”
He expected the happy scream from Sasha.
He didn’t expect Ulrich to faint.
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